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Cournut is concerned with writing and psychoanalysis, whether the writing occurs in the form of dreams noted down, diaries, case histories, psychoanalytic articles, or fiction, published or unpublished. The literary productivity of analysts and analysands suggests that writing is intimately linked to psychoanalysis and psychoanalytic practice and fulfils an obscure need of both patient and analyst. Cournut suggests that there is a dual function in this writing: to obscure and to elucidate. Such resistance is frequently shown by patients who write down their dreams. As an example of this resistance, Cournut considers Freud's Irma dream and the 'detailed analysis' of it. Discerning a theme of writing which Freud neglected in this dream, Cournut suggests that in a thorough analysis of the dream, Irma's letter, the response to her letter, the case history composed for Dr. M, the chemical formula, and a letter to Fliess would certainly have been explored. He ventures an interpretation in supposing that the correspondence with Fliess, including the Project, are concerns about the Irma dream.
In addition, Cournut examines what is specific to writing as a resistance to the analytic process. He notes the freedom and mobility of speaking, the possibility of re-elaboration, and the requirement of a listener in free association. These are contrasted with the solitary pursuit of writing which is characterized by the absence of the other and by the dissemination of the published work far from the author's presence. The writer seeks what is general and universal in his personal experience, while the analysand seeks the personal and individual in his verbalizations.